Jimmy Murphy – Electricity
Craig Havighurst
Posted On May 1, 1999
Quality reissues are fairly common these days, but genuine rediscoveries are harder to come by. This 1978 LP qualifies. Jimmy Murphy’s blunt language, stark blues influence and sacred edge evoke a stirring echo of Hank Williams’ plaintiveness and wit.
Historian Dick Spottswood, in his liner notes, considers Murphy, who was born in Republic, Alabama, in 1925 and died in 1981, one of country music’s should-have-beens. Though he was an engaging and soulful singer and guitar picker, Murphy wasn’t prolific on record. He was recruited by Chet Atkins and made a handful of sides for Columbia and Victor in the early ’50s (since reissued on Bear Family), but they didn’t sell well. After 1960, he dabbled with lightweight labels and divided his time between performing locally and working as a brick mason in Knoxville.
Murphy’s only major concert appearance noted here was a 1977 gig at the National Folk Festival, a few years after Spottswood selected Murphy’s 1951 version of “Electricity” for a Library of Congress folk anthology. That set the process in motion which led to this joyous minor masterpiece, recorded three years before his death.
Sugar Hill boss Barry Poss produced, pulling in young Ricky Skaggs and Jerry Douglas to illuminate Murphy’s songs with mandolin, fiddle and dobro. Eleven of the sixteen cuts are Murphy’s own, ranging from the pure honky-tonk of the opener, “You Touched Me And Made Me Live Again”, through driving folk and deep country blues, both sacred and secular.
The title track is a folksy gospel shout, set to Murphy’s jackhammer fingerpicking on a twelve-string guitar, in which the invisible force flowing through power lines is likened to the mystery of salvation. There are two duets with his wife Flo, whose voice is unnerving but dead on pitch and highly memorable. Murphy’s own voice remains rich and warm and casual, his emotional throttle wide open. He was a gifted blues singer who shines on traditional and classic material such as “Shanty Boat Blues”, “Louise” and “How Long Blues”.
Three tracks supplement the original album: the novelty “Big Mama Blues” and two live gospel numbers, Dutch Coleman’s “John The Baptist” and Murphy’s own ebullient “Holy Ghost Millionaire”.
Unfortunately, Jimmy Murphy remains shrouded in mystery even after close scrutiny of this package. We don’t know how many songs he wrote altogether, or what kinds of ties he had to some of the greats pictured in the booklet, including George Jones, Melba Montgomery and Ray Price. One wishes Spottswood had said more about why Murphy languished in obscurity. There are no hints of strife in his life; he sounds like a man at peace with himself. But no one ever said Nashville was entirely a meritocracy; if it were, Murphy might have been a Hall of Famer.
